Taken
by KickPrevails
Summary: 4x13-Beth is kidnapped. This is the journey that Daryl takes to rescue her.
1. Chapter 1

**This is based off of 4x13, because I freaked out after that episode.**

**Please note that none of this is going to happen in the series, and if it does, wow. But it probably won't. **

**Disclaimer: I don't own The Walking Dead. I wish I did so I could be 100% sure that Beth was safe.**

"She's gone."

Daryl lay on the ground as he looked up at the sky.

"I couldn't save her."

He spread his arms and legs out as if forming a starfish and remained motionless.

He reflected on what had happened the night before. He was amazed on how that lil' girl had such a huge impact on him.

He ran out to the road; they said they'd meet there. Her bag was on the ground. A car took off. At first, he had thought that it was her who had taken off in the car. Then, after he saw her bag, he put two and two together.

There was no car there before. She wouldn't have "dropped" her bag.

As he ran after the car, he could only think about her and this case. The fresh food, the walkers ending up at the door; it all made sense.

The person who lived there must have taken Beth.

The only thing odd about it was that the person living there was showing an act of true kindness by remembering that those things were humans, trying to give them a proper goodbye.

_Could it be a setup?_ Daryl thought as he ran. _The kindness could have been used to lure rabbits like Beth in…_

Hours later, here he was at a crossroad. He didn't know where the car went, and he had no breath to waste on tracking.

And he lay, staring at the sky, cursing at himself for giving up on her.

_It should have been me._

Daryl pounded the road with his hands.

**{Flashback}**

_Beth reached for a can of peanut butter. Daryl quickly snagged it away from her._

"_Hey!" she exclaimed, reaching for it. He opened the can and dipped two of his fingers in. Then, he shoved them in his mouth, and passed the can back over to Beth._

_She looked grumpy instead of disgusted. She followed what Daryl had done, dipping her front two fingers into the peanut butter and licking it gently off of her fingers._

_He grumbled and snatched it back, taking his tongue and licking the rim. Beth snatched it back and did the same, not once complaining about it being was gross. _

_Daryl chuckled in satisfaction. _

"_I gotta go take a piss, unless you'd like to copy me with that, too," he said. He got up from his chair and went to the next room over._

_Beth's happy smile faded slowly as Daryl left. He barely ever left her alone, and when he did, bad thoughts always got into her brain._

"_Daryl, hurry up!" she shouted. She heard him mumble from the other room. _

_Beth started to think about her family and her lower lip stuck out. She let tears streak down her face. Daryl would probably be another few minutes, and right now, nobody was there to see her cry._

_She held back her whimpers by biting her lip. Suddenly, she felt a hand on her shoulder. She didn't even bother to turn around when she heard Daryl's husky voice._

"_Talk."_

_Daryl wasn't one to really be considerate, and after all he's been through, Beth had to choose her words wisely._

"_D…d'ya think Maggie could be alive?"_

_Daryl leaned against the counter behind Beth, looking down at her head._

"_Dunno," he grumbled. He didn't really know how to comfort her._

_He traced his finger around the back of her shoulder, waiting for her to stop crying. He paused when he heard Beth whispering something._

"_What?" Daryl asked. Beth turned around and rested her knees on her chair so she was standing on them and was almost Daryl's height._

"_What?" she replied back._

"_What were you whispering?"_

"_I… I was praying."_

"_Prayin'?"_

"_God… he'll help Maggie. Even if we don't find her anytime soon, she'll be safe." Beth whispered her last three words._

_Daryl shrugged it off and turned around. Beth bowed her head again. Daryl faced the cupboards as she whispered to herself._

"_Dear God… please make sure that Maggie's alright. Please keep her safe. Please help me and Daryl find her soon…"_

_And Daryl looked down at the girl with her head bowed, as tears fell onto her hands._

_She sure was one of a kind._

**{End of Flashback}**

Daryl knew what to do. He hadn't really been faithful in his life… but Beth knew what she was doing. God was sure to help her, and hopefully, he'd help Daryl too.

So Daryl sat on his knees and bowed his head to the ground.

"Dear God…" he said. He stopped. He smacked himself on the head for doing this, but then he remembered Beth. She didn't deserve to die.

"God…" he tried again. He focused on Beth's words, remembering what she said.

"M-make sure she's alright. Keep her safe. She don't deserve any of this. P-please… help me find her. And when I find her, let her okay… as long as ya can. PLEASE!" he shouted, sobbing into the ground.

And just hours later, he looked up to see another group standing before him.


	2. Chapter 2

**Thanks for the reviews, follows, and favorites! I would have updated sooner, I've just been watching Beth/Daryl videos and trying to find the scene where Daryl is found by Joe's group… plus, I've been trying to research more about their group.**

**I hope it pays off in this chapter!**

**(Also, I made a lot of mistakes on grammar and spelling last chapter… I'll try harder this time.)**

**Disclaimer: If I owned The Walking Dead, there would be a scene where Daryl was shirtless. **

"Ya'll got a camp?" Daryl asked Joe, walking beside him.

"Not quite, we've just been searching places nearby."

"Oh."

Daryl looked at the ground and grumbled. He quickened his pace a little, and Harley caught up to him.

"So, how'd you get here?" Harley asked.

Daryl debated with himself on whether or not he should mention the prison or Beth—he told himself that he wouldn't spill too much about the people he knew before. After all, he had just met these people.

"If… if ya went the way I came, there's a funeral home," Daryl said blankly.

"Oh?" Harley said.

"Yeh… I stayed there fer a while, and then I was on my way. I guess maybe I passed out from no food or water."

"Oh, we got plenty o' food," Harley spared, stopping to take something from his backpack. He handed it to Daryl.

Daryl looked at the meat in confusion. Daryl had never seen any kind of meat in that shape.

"Go on, eat up."

Daryl slowly bit into the meat and chewed softly. It didn't taste a lot more different than steak; it just wasn't as juicy and it was more burnt.

"What is this?" asked Daryl.

"We'll tell you in a while. Teach yeh… how to catch it."

Daryl nodded a little and continued eating. Harley walked over to Joe.

Daryl had finally finished the rough meat when Joe stopped the group from moving. Joe huddled everybody up and made orders.

"Daryl, you were just at a funeral home?"

"Yeah…"

There was an awkward silence until Joe announced, "Let's head there, then."

"Wait," Daryl said. "Um… It kinda got… overrun."

Joe's eyes gazed open in shock, and so did the rest of the group's.

"We'll still go."

**Sorry! This one is short, but I'll post more tonight.**


	3. Chapter 3

Another day passed, and the group finally made it back to the home. The worry that Daryl had about the house still being filled with walkers had gone, as the house was just the way he and Beth had left it.

He waited for his new group to settle in, before going back outside to the road. There, Beth's bag lay, dirty and rusted from the two days it was left out here. He slowly picked it up, and stashed it in the chestplate of his jacket before heading inside.

There, the seven men relaxed for a while. Daryl showed them the supply of food and they all chowed down.

Hours later, half of the guys had turned in. Daryl refused to spend a night with them, still being aware, and locked himself in the room with the piano for the night.

Beth's song replayed over and over again in his head when he entered. As soon as he locked the door, he sat on one of the chairs that were facing the coffin. He took out Beth's bag from his jacket and moved a chair over to face him. He rested the bag on the chair and began to go through its contents.

Beth's knife was in the bag. Daryl placed it in his belt loop and continued scrounging. He found the pen that she always used to write in her diary with and used to write the thank-you note… the diary! He felt around in her bag until he pulled out her book.

Figuring he could use some entertainment, he hopped up into the coffin and held the book above him. He turned to the first page, which was all about her early life before the apocalypse. This made him almost tearful, so many happy lives before all this happened.

He, deciding to be more recent, flipped ahead. There, he saw an entry that she wrote about the prison when they had first arrived. After reading the full entry threw the diary across the room. Flipping over on his stomach, he banged his head against the pillow.

He fell asleep with his head buried. It seemed only hours later when he awoke. It shook him when he was about to open the door and he heard the group talking about him.

He pressed his ear to the door and listened.

"He mentioned he was here before. Didn't you find the couple here?"

"Down the road aways. He was driving and she was in the back seat. They were both unarmed… Figured I'd get us a nice ride. Killed the man."

"Great. And the girl?"

"Don't know if she's alive. If she is, maybe we can have some fun with her for a little while. In that time, let's get to know this Daryl a little. Maybe we'll show him on her."

"Great. Get their bodies into the bathroom."

Daryl was confused as to what was happening. These guys obviously weren't the nicest people, but it seemed like Daryl was useful muscle to them. He decided to wait a while, and about an hour passed until he unlocked his door and left.

When he got out, Dan and a man that he hadn't seen before were talking. He joined in the conversation, where Dan explained that the man split off to look for something and found them here. They talked more, and after a while, he seemed to forget the kind of people they were…


	4. Chapter 4

**SO SORRY for not updating for this long! I honestly thought I was going in circles with this story, and I had no plan for it.**

**Actually, the plan I had sucked. **

**But I think I have a better one.**

**Disclaimer: I don't own TWD. If I did, Daryl would be searching for Beth instead of hanging with his DUMB GROUP.**

Joe and Daryl were hunting.

It was week two with Daryl's new group. Daryl had become comfortable, and acted as though every one of those men had replaced Merle in their unhelpful nature and gruff personalities.

The men were planning to raid out the funeral home and go, but they couldn't help staying because of the house's cleanliness.

They came across a log.

"Damn…" Daryl said to himself.

"What?" Joe asked, focusing his eyes on Daryl's and tracing them to where Daryl was staring.

Past the log, there was a family of bunnies. They had been slashed up already, and neither Daryl nor Joe was able to tell if it was a walker scratch or a knife. Both reasoning seemed illogical, because the walker probably would have eaten them whole and whoever slashed them up would have probably eaten them themselves. Nevertheless, the bunnies were as good as dead.

"'Ts a whole family. Should we take 'em back, just in case?" Daryl asked.

"Yeah, we'll have the girl try it first. It'll be good to beef her up, and if it was a walker, none of our men will suffer."

Daryl nodded as Joe picked up the bunnies. Joe turned around.

"What're you doin'?" Daryl asked gruffly.

"Heading back. We got our food, right?"

Daryl gave a mumble at that. He wanted to keep hunting, because the pair had only been out there for 30-some minutes and Daryl was used to hourly hunting.

"I'ma keep goin' for a while, okay?"

Joe nodded and turned to head back. Daryl walked around the woods for a while. He saw a squirrel scampering up a tree. Instantly, he armed his crossbow and pulled the string back. He stuck his arrow in, and without even needing a proper aim, pulled the trigger.

The arrow went right through the squirrel.

He smiled in satisfaction. He walked over sluggishly to retrieve the arrow from the animal's limb body in the tree, when a hand grabbed his arm.

The hand pushed him down. He laid on the ground softly before realizing that he had hit his head on a rock.

He was definitely a little knocked out because of it. He didn't want to get up and the world was spinning. He saw the tiny hand, which was now reaching down to him, as he was able to get a closer look at the hand's owner.

He could recognize that blonde head from anywhere. That slender hand that wrapped her tiny fingers around his wrist and pushed him down.

There stood Beth.


	5. Chapter 5

**I wrote the last chapter I think a week ago, and I was planning on writing more but I got sick. I felt a little better yesterday but I figured I'd watch the finale to tie things together and maybe tie it in this story.**

**But I actually know where I'm going with this now, yay!**

**The finale was not what I expected, but it gave me a pretty good foundation on where I'm going with this.**

**I'll hopefully have more chapters in today.**

**Disclaimer: I donut own TWD. If I did, BETH WOULD BE ALIVE IN THAT TRAIN CART.**

**{Flashback}**

_He wandered around the parking area for a while, mumbling to himself. His motorcycle engine had been faulty, and he had to wait until Tyreese or Michonne got back from their runs because they had the tools to fix it._

_He groaned as he waited, soon becoming bored with himself. His eyebrows rose when he heard a giggle wisp around the air. _

_He drew his attention to the source of the sound. Higher ground from where he stood in the field between where he was and the prison itself were four figures. He could see pretty clearly when he actually took time to make out the four._

_Carl was digging with his sheriff's hat on, and Rick and Hershel were looking over him. Beth was bouncing baby Judith. He watched as Carl's hat fell off and Rick took it._

_Rick placed it atop Beth's head. He then heard laughter from the four. Judith, who he soon realized was sleeping, woke up in a fit of sobs. He watched as the blonde holding her started for the house but Rick stopped her. They talked for a minute and Carl took the baby from her._

_Rick and Carl stomped up to the prison as Hershel and Beth chatted. He looked on, solving his boredom by making up a conversation they could be having._

"_That baby needs to go kick some ass in the prison."_

"_Aww, but I like holdin' her as she pukes on my shoulder!"_

_Daryl smirked at his own conversation until he mentally smacked himself. There was probably a million other things he could do right now. Sure, he did want to go hunt, but he figured that he could do something like look in on storytime or help clean up the prison. He groaned at the thought, but he didn't want to leave without his motorcycle because he was looking forward to going out further than he normally did._

_He sighed as he shut the gates where the vehicles were parked and headed up to the prison. Looking to his left, he saw that Hershel had gone up and Beth was out all alone._

_Daryl decided to talk to her; after all, they were family. He was really distant from her as well as most of the Greenes and a few other original members of their group, but he was curious as to why she was still outside._

_He walked over to her to see her digging._

"_What're ya doin'?" he asked her. She looked up at him, jumping, for he had come out of nowhere. She was slightly confused as to the fact that he was actually talking to her, for they had only talked a few times before. Really, to her, he was just the big bad scary hunter, and to him, she was just there._

"_I wanted to dig," she responded simply. _

"_Any reason?" he asked._

"_I was watchin' Rick and Carl farm before. I figured I might actually be useful for once," she said, letting out a high grunt as she dug the shovel into the ground._

_Daryl nodded shortly. "You take care of Judy when we can't stand her. I think that's use enough."_

_Beth chuckled a little under her breath, looking down. This resulted in the hat coming tumbling down from her head._

_Daryl picked it off from the ground and handed it to her. She gave a "thank you" smile, and he gave a small one back._

"_Just… tell me if ya ever need anythin'." Without waiting for a response, Daryl headed up to the prison. He didn't know why he had extended his hand out to her at that moment but it could be said that he felt bad for her. He himself had always felt useless before all of this and didn't want anyone else to feel like that, especially her, who was much more verbally strong than physically._

**{End of Flashback}**

He looked up at the girl. His head hurt too much to move, and he seemed to slow the spinning.

"You're so worthless," she said.

"Beth?"

"You're weak and stupid. How did you even get here?"

"New group."

"Yeah, the same group that sent a man hunting and took me? How could you not even look for me…"

Daryl ignored his newly acquired information and lay on the ground, staring up at her flawless face.

"You're just going to let them do that… you traitor."

"I was lookin'. I ain't a traitor."

"TRAITOR!"

"I AIN'T A TRAITOR!" Daryl sat up in a start to see a blonde walker lunging towards him. He stood up and pushed the walker down, taking his knife from his belt and shoving it into the walker's eye. He then turned around and headed back.

On his way, he cursed at himself for passing out like that. Feeling the back of his head, blood covered his hand. He remembered years ago when he had lost a lot of blood and imagined Merle there, screaming at him. He figured the blood loss and the hit to the head had made him imagine Beth.

As he walked, he wondered to himself if what she said was really the case. He did know that a man named Byron came to the funeral home and kept two people hostage, one of which was dead.

They were… they were in the bathroom.

Daryl ran faster as he thought harder than his damaged head could handle.

"Mystery meat"… keeping the dead bodies… "You'll know soon enough"… "Show him on her"?! What were these people!

Daryl shook his head as a bad memory came into place. A group of men had followed Daryl and Merle to Merle's friend's house once, and they talked just like Daryl's new group did. They presented them with an odd food. Daryl came to find out that the food was Merle's friend's brother, and was able to get away quickly from the cannibals.

Daryl knew. It was all in how they spoke, what they did. These men…

…were cannibals.


	6. Chapter 6

Daryl pushed the door open with a shove that made the door quickly fly back and slam into the wall behind it. He looked around for Joe. He heard him talking in the dining area with Billy and Byron.

"Now I've here claimed this rabbit, and you have to follow the rules," he heard Joe say. Daryl had learned about their stupid "claimed" rule quickly.

"Can't I have a piece?" he heard one of the other two say. He hadn't really spoken to most of the other men so he was unsure how most of them spoke.

"You seem to have forgotten the rules since you've been gone… but the girl makes up for it. We won't punish you this time," Joe said. Daryl growled.

He stomped into the room, pushed Joe against the counter, and yelled, "WHAT HAVE YOU BEEN DOIN' TO THESE PEOPLE?"

Joe raised his hands in defense. Billy and Byron had been out to fetch their weapons from another room.

"You've been eating these people! The meat and the bodies?! WHAT THE HELL IS WRONG WITH YOU?"

Joe coughed.

"If you let me go, I'll tell you what's happening," Joe said. Daryl growled as he took out his knife, freeing Joe but quickly running for the two doors that led into other rooms and locking them.

"Now if you sit down, I can calmly tell you what's been happening," Joe said. Daryl sat, but still armed himself with his knife.

"The meat? We found it near a sign that said "Terminus". They probably left it there for someone. The bodies? We were keeping them as protection from the lurkers. By showing you stuff, we wanted to teach you our 'claimed' rule, but it seems you caught on soon enough," he said. Daryl tied everything together and found that it unfortunately did make sense and he had been wrong.

Daryl was, however, still aware that if the girl was alive, she was being tortured. He knew before that these men were bad men and even though they weren't cannibals, they were still evil. Daryl had heard them talking about a man that they were setting out to kill.

"I'm leavin' today, but I want to talk to the girl first, if she's alive," Daryl said.

"She is alive… but she's dying. Go ahead and talk to her before you go."

Daryl nodded and unlocked both doors. He then followed the hall that led to the bathroom.

The first thing he noticed when he entered the bathroom was the grey sweater and dirty, bloody yellow polo shirt. The blonde hair of the girl was down as the girl coughed.

"Beth?"


	7. Chapter 7

He turned the girl around to see that she was indeed not Beth. He grabbed her shoulders.

"Where did you get that shirt and sweater," Daryl asked forcefully. The girl looked up to him fearfully and didn't answer.

Daryl shut the door behind him. "Look, I'm not going to hurt you. The girl I was with got taken by a car and I…"

She tugged at his sleeve and nodded.

"Daryl?" she said. His eyes filled with hope and he smiled for the first time in a while.

"Yeah, that's me."

"Beth was talking about you. A man… he took her in a car. We were together in the back seat. He had done things and I didn't have a top on, so she was nice enough to give me hers…" the girl sobbed a little. "The driver was shot. Beth opened the door and tried to get out. She grabbed me, told me to come on… I told her to leave me. I was numb from a while earlier and could barely move."

"So she's out there?" Daryl asked with hope. The girl nodded.

"Here," she said, unbuttoning the sweater. "When you find her, give this back to her."

Daryl stopped her.

"I'll just give her my jacket, it'll be fine, keep it. She would have wanted you to."

Daryl headed for the bathroom door when the girl's voice stopped him.

"She has hope that you'll find her," the girl said. Daryl turned and saw the smile on her face. Daryl quickly stepped out and headed to the room on the far end with the piano and coffin. He picked up Beth's bag and put all of her contents back into it. He left the room and grabbed his crossbow from the table. Without a goodbye, he left the men, walking past the graves and back into the woods.


	8. Chapter 8

**Before starting this, I do want to point out that I was debating if Daryl should take the girl along. I decided against it. We do all know that Daryl isn't one to really play the superhero. If I didn't clear it up already, she told Beth to leave her when she thought she'd be dead weight. The girl was injured and knew that Beth only had so long lasting out there alone. She didn't dare stop Daryl from going without her, and he didn't take her along because she did say she told Beth to leave without her.**

**Remember, don't hesitate to Private Message me if there's any confusion.**

Daryl never thought he had a purpose for anything.

Sure, he had to protect his group.

But really, they all could do just as well without him.

What would he have gained if he had found Sophia?

Daryl never thought he had a purpose for anything.

And now he did.

He walked along the narrow path given by the woods. He had been walking since day, and now the sun was setting. It'd be awfully hard to track at night, but he wouldn't want to risk her getting hurt because he was too tired. Sighing, he continued along the path.

Darkness struck, and he saw the path he had followed narrow, and soon come to an end. He looked past to see a clearing. Taking two steps further, he saw the recognizable railroad tracks.

He wasn't sure if he was relieved or not, and he still didn't know when he saw the familiar pile of bodies. How did he know it was the pile the pair had passed at the start of their journey? The lone kid's sized shoe.

This sadly made more memories flow into his brain. How Beth was crying over the bodies and he was just… watching. He wanted to bang his head on a tree, cursing at himself for not helping her if he was there.

He should have done something.

He felt stupid sometimes. Maybe not really stupid, but like he could do more. He wanted to help her, wanted to comfort her. Was it his own nature that stopped him? He was unsure then, but now, he knows that whatever stopped him is gone.

He remembered telling Beth all about his past, swapping stories about life before "it" all happened. He remembered the smile on her face as she told him the story of Maggie, Shawn and her at the pond, and when her dad found them. He missed her smile.

He didn't regret a word he had said to her, and she felt the same. They didn't talk about the moment again, or the memories, because that talk had only made their bond stronger. And stronger it was.

Daryl remembered walking with her as the black smoke continued to rise, and they laughed at the fact that the fire still hadn't gone out and had probably spread to the wispy trees behind it. They laughed at the people who could have seen it and thought it was a wildfire.

Daryl remembered his dad's cabin.

"We should burn it down."

He remembered her smile when she said that, like she was telling a joke. She had smiled up at him when he stood up and agreed.

He never wanted to go there again, but at the same time, he wondered if Beth would be there. Maybe she would try to meet up with him somewhere, surprise him. It happened before, when the group met up at the highway after getting all split up. As much as Carol whined about not wanting to go back, remembering her girl's pale, scared-looking face as she hid under the car, Daryl knew the group would be there. They kept driving and soon enough, when they looked behind them, the rest of the group was following.

Beth was there when they all met up, hugging her father and sister. Beth remembers. Beth knows that Daryl remembers, too.

It wouldn't hurt. She may not be very good with directions, or at least as good as him, but it wouldn't hurt to check. It's just the type of person she is to go back to a place they used to know.

Daryl settled it with himself. He was going back to his father's cabin.


End file.
